1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a tape cutter which folds back a longitudinal side edge of adhesive tape pulled out to have a desired length from an adhesive-tape roll so that opposite adhesive faces stick together to form a non-adhesive portion, and adhesive tape for use by the tape cutter.
2. Description of the Related Art
Adhesive tape is a thin film-like strip base made of cloth, cellophane, craft paper, rubber, polyvinyl chloride, or the like which has its one surface coated with an adhesive made mainly from rubber or synthetic resin, and usually this adhesive tape is rolled into an adhesive-tape roll, which is available on the market. Such adhesive tapes are used in various sticking applications such as closing envelops or bags, or joining boxes and lids.
When using such adhesive tape, the adhesive tape is pulled out from an adhesive-tape roll and cut to have a desired length. In order to facilitate this task, a tape cutter is used.
The tape cutter comprises a tape holder to rotatably support an adhesive-tape roll and a cutting section to cut adhesive tape pulled out, and enables adhesive tape pulled out to have a desired length to be easily cut without using a tool such as a pair of scissors or a cutter knife, for being provided to adhere to objects to be joined.
Although being for use in various sticking applications, adhesive tapes are often used to temporarily join, and after use, removed or cut.
Since the strip base of the adhesive tape is thin and has its one entire surface coated with an adhesive, it is fairly troublesome to remove the adhesive tape sticking to an object from it. That is, when removing an adhesive tape whose entire adhesive face is sticking to an object, one needs to turn up the outer edge of the adhesive tape with his/her nail so as to form a picking-off margin, and takes hold of the picking-off margin with the tips of his/her fingers and picks the adhesive tape off. The turning up of a picking-off margin causes much trouble.
For example, for food such as boxed meals and daily dishes sold at convenience stores, adhesive tapes of about ten and several mm in width are often used to attach lids to food containers or to stick seasoning bags having seasoning such as sauce or dressing enclosed therein to the outside of food containers. If the adhesive tape is stuck across the entire surface, a purchaser has much difficulty and trouble in picking the adhesive tape off to open the lid of the container or remove the seasoning bag from the container.
Accordingly, in the conventional art, an adhesive tape cutter technique is disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open Publication No. 2001-302078 where in order to facilitate the picking-off, while pulling out adhesive tape, a side edge of the adhesive tape is automatically folded back along the longitudinal side so that opposite adhesive faces stick together to form a non-adhesive, picking-off portion.
The adhesive tape cutter disclosed in the above-referenced publication is configured as follows (1 to 8):    1) to have a support shaft rotatably supporting an adhesive-tape roll on one side of its casing and an adhesive-holding portion for a tape pulled out and a cutting blade on the other side;    2) to have a double-portion forming means that folds back a side edge of a predetermined width of the pulled-out adhesive tape along the longitudinal side so that opposite adhesive faces stick together to form a non-adhesive, picking-off portion, in an adhesive tape pulling-out path from the tape roll to the adhesive-holding portion;    3) the double-portion forming means comprising a pulling-out guide roller, a bending roller, a side bending guide roller, a conical folding roller, an adhesive face-side press roller, and a non-adhesive face-side press roller, which are arranged in that order from the support shaft side to the adhesive-holding portion side;    4) to have an open/close member that covers the adhesive tape pulling-out path in an openable/closable manner and freely rotates upwards about the pulling-out guide roller supported by the casing above the adhesive tape pulling-out path;    5) wherein the bending roller is supported by the casing and contacts the adhesive face of the adhesive tape except for a side edge of a predetermined width to be bent, and the side bending guide roller is vertically supported by the casing such that its circumferential surface faces an end face of the bending roller and contacts and presses against the non-adhesive face of the side edge, not contacting the bending roller, to sandwich this side edge between the end face of the bending roller and itself and to bend the side edge of the predetermined width backward or in the direction that the adhesive face is facing to be at an angle of about 90°;    6) wherein the adhesive face-side press roller and the non-adhesive face-side press roller are arranged vertically and sandwich and press the adhesive tape against each other;    7) wherein the non-adhesive face-side press roller is supported by the open/close member and, when the open/close member is opened/closed, is moved from/to the adhesive face-side press roller; and    8) wherein the loading of the adhesive tape is performed when the open/close member is open upwards, in which the adhesive tape is passed under the pulling-out guide roller, then above the bending roller, the conical folding roller, and the adhesive face-side press roller, and after the leading end of the adhesive tape is attached onto the adhesive-holding portion, the side edge of the adhesive tape is bent into between the bending roller and the side bending guide roller, and then the open/close member is closed to finish the loading.
However, in the conventional adhesive tape cutter described in the above-referenced publication, the open/close member is rotated to open/close about the rotation axis of the pulling-out guide roller nearest the tape support. Hence, the path for the adhesive tape to pass through cannot be exposed open over its entire length. Thus, it is a troublesome task particularly to pass adhesive tape under the pulling-out guide roller. Moreover, the task of bending and inserting a side edge of the pulled-out adhesive tape into between the bending roller and the side bending guide roller is necessary but causes much trouble.